Studio: international art (38.1906)

Austrian Peasant Ornaments

FIGS. 8 & 9. SILVER FILIGRFE NECKLETS, WITH GOLD CLASPS SET WITH GLASS
STONES—FROM UPPER AUSTRIA
(K. k. Museum fiir Volkskunde, Vienna)

silver smiths living in the
cities, and some to the
bashful lover who wrought
his humble offering with
his own hands. There are
stages between these ex-
tremes ; and they vary
vastly as to material, from
the richest gold to brass
and iron, from ivory to
bone. But it is about
those ornaments or trin-
kets which the peasants
have made themselves
that I wish to speak to-
day, for an instructive les-
son is to be gained from
these humble workers of
the soil, whose few hours
of leisure in summer and
enforced idle evenings
during the long and hard
winters were spent in
fashioning their love tokens for their “ treasures,”
■as lovers are called in these parts. Nothing gives
a surer proof of the inborn feeling for art in the
peoples constituting the population of the Austrian
■empire: Germans, Czechs, Ruthenians, Poles,
Bosnians, Tyrolese, Styrians, Croats, Dalmat:ans,
to name only a few; and this feeling finds expres-

sion in their homes, in their costumes, and in
their surroundings.

A study of these peasants’ costumes is essential
to a study of their ornaments; but as space is
limited our remarks on this head must be brief.
The every-day garments are and always have been
simple, but those worn on Sundays, Saints’ days and

FIG. IO. SILVER FILLET AND EARRINGS, SET WITH STONES - DALMATIAN
(K. k. Museum fiir Volkskunde, Vienna)

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